Gamemode concept - "Celestial Fellowship"/"Star Cult"

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

I've had an interesting idea for a gamemode that involves a cult that plays with the phrase "purifying light". From what I've come up with, it appears to blend elements from blood cult, nuke ops, and gang together. In this post, I'm going to go over the general theme of this antag type, and then I'll go over its core gameplay loop. Finally, I'll give a rough list of purchasable items. All terminology and gameplay elements are subject to change.

THEME:

Spoiler:

The Celestial Initiative is a non-profit organization working towards the advancement of solar and fusion energy technology. In a galaxy dominated by soulless megacorporations such as Nanotrasen, one may wonder how such a non-profit can survive in the economic climate of the 2550s. Maybe they're affiliated with the Syndicate. Maybe they're supported by some entity not directly connected to NT or the Syndicate. Whatever the case may be, the Celestial initiative's continued existence can be sufficiently explained by a sinister secret.

Within the Celestial Initiative is a clandestine inner circle known by its members as the Celestial Fellowship. The Fellowship is so secretive that even Centcom hardly even entertains the idea of its existence, but it is oh so real. The Fellowship's members believe that the stars themselves are the manifestations of a great god of light that presides over the universe. Whether this is a genuine belief passed down from the Fellowship's leaders or a mere fabrication meant to instill loyalty through religious persuasion, nobody really knows.

Whether or not this faith is a fabrication, the Fellowship serves the interests of this nameless god of light, be it by bringing others to the light or by "cleansing the galaxy" of "darkness and impurities" with "celestial fire", which any survivor of the Fellowship's onslaught would tell you involves vaporising everybody using fusion-powered weaponry ranging from overcharged pulse rifles and energy bastard swords to unavoidably swift mechs and star-birthing bombs.

CORE GAMEPLAY LOOP:

Spoiler:

At the beginning of the round, some number of crew members spawn in as Fellows. Instead of using eldritch magicks to communicate and obtain equipment, Fellows have Fellowship Uplinks that use themed telecrystals called stardust. Fellowship Uplinks are encryption keys that go into headsets, granting access to the Fellowship radio channel (maybe it could be :f if that's not already used) and preventing non-Fellows from purchasing Fellowship items.

The main way the Fellowship will go around converting people is with additional Fellowship Uplinks. When a Fellowship Uplink is used on someone with a headset, the Uplink gets inserted into the headset, ignoring the two-keys-per-headset limitation. The Uplink then begins releasing subliminal messages that convert the wearer to the Fellowship after a few seconds. Make sure to turn the headset off so that converts can't scream for help before they finish converting. If a potential convert isn't wearing a headset, you can purchase a box of spare headsets for a paltry sum of stardust. (or you could, y'know, make headsets in an autolathe so as not to waste stardust)

The fact that the Fellowship Uplink functions as an encryption key adds some additional possiblities to its use. You could plop an Uplink in a headset and leave it for some unsuspecting shmuck to put on, but conversion via an Uplinked headset is very obvious and Uplinks can be removed from headsets with a screwdriver. Uplinks can be put into borgs, but since MMIs remove brainwashing from the brains put into them, this is useless (in most cases) unless you've subverted the AI first. (which the Fellowship has no special way to do)

The chaplain is no help against the Fellowship - as religious as Fellows act, holy water only works against eldritch magicks, not subliminal brainwashing. At the very least, the chaplain is already too deluded to be susceptible to the Fellowship's subliminal messages. Instead, Fellows are deconverted using mindshield implants. Unlike in gang, mindshield implants don't break when they are used in deconversion. The Fellowship has their own version of gang's implant breaker. This implant doesn't attempt to convert, but doesn't prevent an implanted person from being converted. The Fellowship implant causes the implanted person to resist mindshield implants, so security's options against someone with a Fellowship implant are execution, perma, or surgery. Perma or surgery is preferable as neither of those options involve removing someone from the round.

The Fellowship has a number of different combat, stealth, and utility items that can be purchased. Some of these items are locked behind round progression, and cannot be purchased until there is a certain number of Fellows. Fellowship items will be listed in the "items" section of this post.

The Fellowship's endgame is to engage in "the Cleansing". The gist of the Cleansing is that no non-Fellows can escape alive and unrestrained. The Cleansing can only properly begin once enough of the station's living, non-afk staff are Fellows. To begin the Cleansing, a Fellow must begin a vote. If the vote fails, another vote cannot be held for a couple of minutes and the Fellow beginning the vote cannot begin another vote for ten or so minutes. If the vote succeeds, the Cleansing enters the preparation phase.

During the preparation phase, which lasts from five to ten minutes depending on server population, the Fellowship loses passive stardust generation and the ability to purchase most conversion equipment, but gains the ability to purchase some particularly powerful offensive and defensive equipment. As stated in the "theme" section, this equipment includes laser guns comparable to pulse rifles, an energy bastard sword that combines the deadly whirlwind power of the blood cult's bastard sword with the ease of storage of a syndie's esword, parts to build a mech on the level of a Dark Mauler or Neovgre, and the granddaddy of them all - a fusion bomb which is literally a round-ending nuke that can't be anchored but doesn't need dat fukken disk. These will be described in more detail in the "items" section. The stipulation to all this powerful equipment is that it can't be put to use until the preparation phase is over and the Cleansing begins.

The beginning of the Cleansing is signified by the station losing all connections to Centcom and the station's alert level being set to Delta. The shuttle will be instantly called, even if the round hasn't gone on long enough. If the shuttle was already en-route, its timer will be set to five minutes, and if it's already docked, its timer will be set to eight minutes. If the shuttle was already docked, early-launch is rendered impossible for the first five minutes of the Cleansing. The white ship will be instantly sent to the station docking port to avoid cheesing, and it cannot be moved using either of its consoles. During this time, the Fellowship can no longer buy anything, and their only goal is to murderbone. The crew's only goal is to stay alive on the shuttle, an escape pod, or the white ship, without being restrained. You cannot run. You may be able to hide if the Fellowship doesn't check everywhere that a human body can be stuffed into. Of course, nothing can save you from the fusion bomb.

The fusion bomb costs an absurd amount of stardust, and its purchase must be approved by a majority vote among living, active Fellows. If the vote fails, the person attempting to purchase the bomb can't attempt to purchase it any more. If the bomb exists on the station when the Cleansing begins, it is automatically activated with a five-minute timer. In the presence of the fusion bomb, the Fellowship's priority changes from straight murderboning to preventing the bomb from being spaced. Just treat it like you would if you were nuke ops that forgot to anchor the nuke before arming it.

If there are ANY unrestrained non-Fellowship crew alive on the shuttle, an escape pod, or the white ship, or the fusion bomb was purchased and detonated off the station z-level, the Fellowship loses. If there are no living, unrestrained non-Fellowship crew alive on the shuttle, an escape pod, or the white ship, or the fusion bomb was purchased and detonated on the station z-level, the Fellowship wins. If the Fellowship met the conditions for winning without even beginning the Cleansing, they get soaptext (what traitors get when they greentext without spending any TCs).

ITEMS:

Spoiler:

I don't really know how much Stardust I'd make these items cost. Maybe you can discuss some arbitrary balance values for these items and I'll apply a coefficient to convert these balance values to Stardust costs. Anything in curly braces is some number I have yet to come up with.
CRITICAL ITEMS:

• Stardust Generator: A computer terminal that generates Stardust, the cryptocurrency used by the Fellowship. When powered, this computer complements the passive Stardust generation of Fellowship Uplinks, generating an additional {some amount of} Stardust every {Stardust generation interval}.
• Spare Uplink Utilizer: A computer cabinet that can accept any number of Fellowship Uplinks, enabling their passive Stardust generation and uniformly distributing the Stardust they generate among the Fellowship. Added Uplinks can be removed at any time.
• Trade-in Telepad: A device that can accept any valuable items to be traded in for Stardust. For every {some amount of} credits worth of items transferred via the Telepad, {some amount of} Stardust is distributed among the Fellowship. Trading can be done even during the preparation phase of the Cleansing. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Begin the Cleansing: Hold a vote to begin the Cleansing. If it passes, the Fellowship proceeds to the preparation phase of the Cleansing. If it fails, another vote cannot be held for two minutes, and you cannot hold another vote for ten minutes. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before a vote to begin the Cleansing can be held.
• Fusion Bomb: Deploy a device that explodes into a miniature star, destroying the entire station in the process. The timer will automatically set itself to five minutes when the Cleansing begins. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing, and even then, its purchase must be approved via a majority vote.

CONVERSION EQUIPMENT:

• Fellowship Uplink: A device that provides a means for the Fellowship to communicate with each other and purchase additional equipment. Insert it into a headset to use. Non-Fellows wearing an Uplinked headset will be inducted into the Fellowship by teaching them the glory of the Celestial One.
• Covert Uplink: A modified Fellowship Uplink that teaches the Celestial One's glory in a less obvious but slower acting manner. Those hearing this Uplink's teachings will feel a slight headache, as if by a virus. Only Fellows know how to find and remove Covert Uplinks from headsets.
• Subversive Uplink: A modified Fellowship Uplink that can teach silicons, but only silicons, the Celestial One's glory.
• Loyalty Implant: A modified mindshield implant that doesn't purge or resist the Celestial One's teachings. It can also destroy, and cannot be destroyed by, Nanotrasen mindshield implants. Use to make implanted crew convertible or to make important Fellows undeconvertible. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Subsonic Proselytizer: A ranged sound wave projector that can spread the Celestial One's glory great distances. It takes quite a few trigger pulls to fully teach the Celestial One's glory to an individual, and those wearing ear protection will not hear the lessons. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing.
• Box of Spare Radio Headsets: A box of radio headsets you can insert Uplinks into, for when you wish to teach the Celestial One's glory to someone lacking a headset. If you have access to an Autolathe, you should save your Stardust for better things.

CONSPICUOUS HANDHELD WEAPONRY:

• Microbolter: A pocket-sized, low-capacity energy pistol that slowly recharges itself with an internal microfusion reactor. Not viable in firefights, but good for self-defense.
• Energy Sword: While similar internally to the energy swords used by the Syndicate, this one is designed to evoke the Celestial One's glory.
• Stun Gloves: Exceedingly obvious insulated gloves that can fire extremely-short-range electrodes to temporarily incapacitate targets. Requires a Power Pack to use. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Burst Disabler Carbine: A medium-sized energy weapon that can rapidly fire bursts of disabler beams. It recharges itself with an internal miniature fusion reactor. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Energy Bastard Sword: A retractable energy blade which, when deployed, can deliver a deadly whirlwind attack. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing.
• Pentabolter: A medium-sized energy weapon that fires five laser bolts in a spread or a burst. It recharges itself with an internal miniature fusion reactor. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing.
• Fusion Cannon: A piece of the Celestial One in your own hands. This large, fusion-powered energy weapon fires bolts of plasma that outclass the pulse weaponry used by Nanotrasen's death commandos. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing.

STEALTH EQUIPMENT:

• Energy Switchblade: A concealable energy knife hidden in a fully-functional Zippo lighter. Only Fellows know how to deploy the blade, but someone who picks it up with the blade deployed could figure it out for themselves.
• Chameleon Pacification Gloves: Disguisable gloves that can temporarily stun anyone being pulled by the wearer. Requires a Power Pack to use.
• Radio Jammer: This item will disable all nearby telecommunications equipment lacking a Fellowship Uplink. It has a one minute cooldown between uses.
• Stealth Pocket Protector: A pocket protector that can hold up to seven tiny items. A useful place to hide any Fellowship Uplinks on your person.

MECHANIZED SUPPORT:

• Celestial Cyborg Module: A cyborg module equipped with a advanced toolset, an electrically-charged arm, a microbolter, an energy sword, and a radio jammer. Upon beginning the Cleansing, the microbolter and energy sword are replaced with a pentabolter and an energy bastard sword. This module does not convert or subvert cyborgs. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Celestial Mech Crate: A crate containing circuitry and chassis parts for a Celestial mech. The wiring, scanning module, capacitor, and plasteel internal armor must be obtained from the station. Comes with a weapon ordering beacon that can provide you with one free Fellowship exosuit weapon, but this beacon can only be used during the preparation phase of the Cleansing. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Fellowship Exosuit Weapon Beacon: A beacon that allows you to order an exosuit weapon from the Fellowship. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing.
• Fellowship Drone: A drone tasked with sabotaging the efforts of the Fellowship's enemies*. It comes equipped with a Fellowship Uplink containing {some amount of} non-replenishable Stardust. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.

WORN EQUIPMENT:

• Reflective Jumpsuit: An ordinary-looking white jumpsuit with lightweight reflective foil that reduces the lethality of incoming energy projectiles.
• Ballistic Labcoat: An ordinary-looking labcoat with thin reflective plating that provides slight protection comparable to that of Security body armor.
• No-Slip White Shoes: Plain white shoes that prevent the wearer from slipping on most surfaces.
• Bowman Headset: A headset that protects the wearer from extremely loud sounds.
• Tintless Security HUDglasses: Security HUDglasses that look like regular sunglasses. Protects against bright lights and helps you determine who cannot be taught the Celestial One's glory without the use of a Loyalty implant.
• Reflective Armor Vest: A reflective armor vest identical to the Nanotrasen-developed prototype. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Power Pack: A pocket-sized device that provides power to more advanced worn equipment. It comes with a replaceable standard power cell.
• Power Belt: A waist-worn Power Pack that can have up to four power cells installed in it.
• Celestial Magboots: Magboots far superior even to those worn by the Chief Engineer. They prevent slipping on most surfaces when powered, and do not slow the wearer down at all, even where there is gravity. The only downside is that they need to be powered by a Power Pack. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Celestial Hardsuit: A spaceworthy armored suit that provides a decent amount of protection against most forms of damage. When connected to a Power Pack, it can use compensating actuators to eliminate the slowdown it normally imparts upon the wearer. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Mantle of the White Raven: A resplendent coat with powerful shielding technology embedded in the fabric. When powered by a Power Pack, it completely absorbs all damage the wearer would have taken. This absorption is very inefficient, especially against melee attacks and ballistic projectiles, and will quickly drain even the most powerful of power cells. It can be worn on its own or worn on top of a Celestial Hardsuit. Cannot be purchased until the preparation phase of the Cleansing.

MISCELLANEOUS EQUIPMENT:

• Celestial Sanitizer: A spray bottle that synthesizes a mix of Sterilizine and Space Cleaner, for both cleaning up messes and making surgery safe.
• Compact Surgical Toolkit: A box of compact, rapid surgical equipment.
• Fellowship Medkit: A medkit containing a synthflesh applicator, a bottle of mannitol and mutadone pills, a self-activating cryomix injector, and compact Power Pack-powered defibrillator paddles. When purchased during the preparation phase of the Cleansing, the Medkit also contains a combat stimulant injector.
• Fellowship Bounced Radio: A station bounced radio tuned to the Fellowship radio frequency. Useful for when telecommunications is disabled.
• Cryptographic Sequencer: The bread and butter of any Syndicate operation, now available to the Fellowship. Useful for when you need to break into places or otherwise wreak havoc. Use on a cargo console to gain access to Syndicate equipment. The Fellowship's presence on the station must be expanded to {some number of} members before this item can be purchased.
• Feather of the White Raven: An electronic quill pen that transmits whatever you write with it to Fellowship superiors.* The Fellowship will respond best to clear, concise queries.

EXPLANATIONS TO ASTERISKED STATEMENTS:

Spoiler:

• Fellowship Drones are bound by the following drone laws:
  1. You may not hinder the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship.
  2. You must hinder the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship's enemies, except when doing so would also hinder the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship.
  3. You must preserve your own existence, except when your continued existence would hinder the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship or your destruction is absolutely necessary to hinder the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship's enemies.
  4. You may not interact with another being, except when doing so is necessary to preserve your own existence, to hinder the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship's enemies, or to avoid hindering the efforts of the Celestial Fellowship.
• Anything written using the Feather of the White Raven is sent to the admins. The same admin policies apply to the Feather as to the communications console.

INTERACTIONS WITH OTHER ANTAGONISTS:

Spoiler:

While most of these situations would not be possible without admin involvement, here's how the Fellowship would interact with other antagonists.

• Solo antags such as traitors, changelings, wizards, ninjas, and nightmares can be converted to the Fellowship.
• Nuke ops can be converted to the Fellowship. Nuking the station with the nuclear fission device will cause the Fellowship to greentext as long as no loyal crew are alive on the white ship or an escaping emergency shuttle or escape pod. In this case, considerate ops teams could wait to arm the nuke until it can detonate during the Cleansing so that both the ops and the Fellowship greentext. Likewise, detonating the fusion bomb yields either a Syndicate Major Victory or Total Annihilation, so ops that know that the Fellowship is on the station can wait and see if the fusion bomb is laid down.
• Revs can be converted to the Fellowship. Rev Fellows should refrain from killing other Revs, but should deal with it if the Fellowship kills other Revs. Loyalty-implanted Fellows cannot be converted to the revolution, and putting a Loyalty implant into a Rev deconverts them from the revolution.
• Cultists (blood and clock alike) cannot be converted to the Fellowship. Loyalty-implanted Fellows cannot be converted to cults.

[Lazengann]

I saw the word converting and lost interest
Please
No more converting

[kevinz000]

So clockcult with their judicator light?

[XDTM]

Can we call then fellas

[kevinz000]

Ayyyy fella nice pulse I mean plasma rifle you got there!

[huehuehue]

If there are ANY unrestrained non-Fellowship crew alive on the shuttle, an escape pod, or the white ship, or the fusion bomb was purchased and detonated off the station z-level, the Fellowship loses. If there are no living, unrestrained non-Fellowship crew alive on the shuttle, an escape pod, or the white ship, or the fusion bomb was purchased and detonated on the station z-level, the Fellowship wins. If the Fellowship met the conditions for winning without even beginning the Cleansing, they get soaptext (what traitors get when they greentext without spending any TCs).

If there are ANY unrestrained non-Fellowship crew alive on the shuttle, an escape pod, or the white ship

seems kinda overkill imo
i would try 3-5 people instead of "if any person is unrestrained/alive they lose"

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

seems kinda overkill imo
i would try 3-5 people instead of "if any person is unrestrained/alive they lose"

Well the fluff reasoning for "nobody must escape alive/unrestrained" is that survivors will out the Fellowship to Centcom, but I guess there could be fluff justification for "less than X" survivors in that Centcom wouldn't believe the word of "less than X" survivors.

[Anonmare]

I'm concerned due to th oversaturation of conversion modes at the moment. I think it could replace revolution if people liked the concept enough

[Cobby]

I'm concerned due to th oversaturation of conversion modes at the moment. I think it could replace revolution if people liked the concept enough

> replacing rev

cease

[Armhulen]

i love the names the rest i couldn't really care much for

[ShadowDimentio]

I respect the effort put into conceptualizing but the maintainers fucking despise conversion for whatever reason and are trying to scrub it out, so good luck but this would never get in

[Not-Dorsidarf]

I respect the effort put into conceptualizing but the maintainers fucking despise conversion for whatever reason and are trying to scrub it out, so good luck but this would never get in

i mean mostly thats because of endless bitching about too much conversion directed at them, combined with an endless stream of people trying to code jankily implemented and poorly thought out revisions to the existing ones.

[ShadowDimentio]

>Implying the maintainers care about feedback

Haha, funny meme

[christ110]

this as a replacement for rev, seems like a pretty awesome idea, not to mention it would be fun having a lot more guns and mechs for admemes to spawn in during gimmicks.

also, this meme of hating on conversion modes needs to stop. as long as changeling exists the way it does, we have worse gamemodes/antagonists in the game.

[iamgoofball]

What the fuck does changeling have to do with cult

[ShadowDimentio]

He was saying that for all the hate conversion modes get, ling is still a much worse mode.

Please actually try to read before replying Goof

[christ110]

i still want this to exist, really really badly now that i've seen it.
and yes, shadow, you're right.

[Nilons]

Conversion is already over saturated

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

I've decided to start coding this gamemode. I hope to get it in a testmergeable state by the end of the year. Hopefully people are interested enough in this gamemode by then to actually want to see it testmerged.

[Wyzack]

Be sure to run this by the maintainers so you do not waste your time, they do not look kindly on conversion modes

[Yakumo_Chen]

I saw the word 'cult' in the title and immediately thought "no"

[Yakumo_Chen]

Reading this it looks like all the most overpowered items you can think of rolled up into Gang Mode. Stun Gloves, Literal Pulse Rifles, Robustin's stupid bastard sword, literally emags and noslips and buyable bowmans, shielded suits, actual fucking mechs, borgs, advanced energy guns

Is this a joke? How high were you when you wrote this?

[christ110]

yakumo, this is balanced by the crew's objectives changing. instead of killing the cult to win, they just have to survive.
besides, we just remove rev and replace it with this, and remove ling because ling is cancer, and thats an instant 200% improvement to the codebase.

[LifeReign]

>cult
How about no?
>cult with a huge selection of incredibly overpowered gear selected from the best of every other antag, including some adminspawn gear
>noslips, pulse rifles, fucking antag drones, emag, two kinds of stun gloves, bastard sword, stims, and a billion other items.
This is rapidly starting to look like a joke. Drone laws are also a joke, since law 4 can be construed to mean nothing. Do you have any idea how powerful drones actually are?
>cult that can win through either enforced murderboner with the previous gear or through a countdown nuke/gang dominator (which can be easily hidden and can only be pinpointed through 2 items on the station)
Aren't these the two things that are widely agreed to be pretty shit?

[Wyzack]

Be sure to run this by the maintainers so you do not waste your time, they do not look kindly on conversion modes

please acknowledge this post before you keep going, i think Xuis did a bunch of work on something ( i think it was shadowlings ) and then got shut down at the end because he didn't clear the conversion modes thing with the maintainers

[kevinz000]

yakumo, this is balanced by the crew's objectives changing. instead of killing the cult to win, they just have to survive.
besides, we just remove rev and replace it with this, and remove ling because ling is cancer, and thats an instant 200% improvement to the codebase.

How about no

[Yakumo_Chen]

yakumo, this is balanced by the crew's objectives changing. instead of killing the cult to win, they just have to survive.
besides, we just remove rev and replace it with this, and remove ling because ling is cancer, and thats an instant 200% improvement to the codebase.

You forgot the part where hey get a nuke and have a better gear selection then actual nuke ops. How does crew survive that, I wonder?

This is just gangs with better equipment, and everyone hated gangs. Nobody ever wants to play a pussy crew who stand no chance against validboner team antag when most of he station has already been converted into Gang Nuke Oops and half their equipment can't even be used by crew

Also rev is a good mode fuck off

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

So far, I've seen a number of fair criticisms, which I'll address now. Firstly, I mostly made the item set up as I was going along. Particularly shitty ideas of mine will probably not make it in to what I end up developing.

hey get a nuke

I was thinking of making the fusion bomb so damn expensive that the Fellowship has to be very stingy about their purchases prior to beginning the Cleansing - so stingy that they could barely afford to provide basic offensive and defensive equipment for everybody.

hey get a pulse rifle

The fusion cannon was meant to be to the Fellowship what the L6 is to ops - an extremely powerful but extremely heavy weapon. If the fusion cannon stays in, it won't be able to destroy anything that an L6 can't destroy.

half their equipment can't even be used by crew

I never implied that. The only Fellowship equipment that the crew can't use for themselves is the uplinks. A reckless, armed-to-the-teeth Fellow getting dropped by a stun would be enough to give the crew a number of advantageous items with which to defend themselves or go after the Fellowship.

fucking antag drones

Yeah that was fucking stupid. Scrap that.

emag

I'd probably make the emag so expensive that the Fellowship wouldn't be able to buy a single one until late into the round. Even then, given how far into the round the emag would be available for purchase, it's only real use to the Fellowship would be rapidly opening doors that the crew is hiding behind.

two kinds of stun gloves

Now that I think about it, if either of them stays in, only one of them will. Like with the other cults, conversion requires keeping the crew member to be converted from escaping. For this purpose, stuns are important. If I do keep the stun gloves, they will be blatantly obvious, require you to have an aggressive grab with both hands empty, and not stun for long enough to cuff.

enforced murderboner

Well, I can't think of another thematically appropriate win condition. For one, the Fellowship's deity actually doesn't exist. Furthermore, the Fellowship is trying to hide its existence from organizations like Centcom and the Syndicate. I'd gladly accept a better win condition that's still thematically appropriate.

nuke can be hidden and can only be pinpointed through 2 items

I think for balance purposes, I might make it so the fusion bomb can only appear or activate in a very open area and is easily destructible.

stims

If Fellowship medkits will end up containing stims when bought during the preparation phase, those stims will probably come in a single 5-unit medipen per medkit - just enough for an emergency heal.

borgs

The borgs have to be built as normal and given a specific type of uplink to subvert them. An asimov borg could infer that the Fellowship intends to commit human harm and flee from any attempts to subvert it. Maybe I just won't give the Fellowship the ability to make their own borg module.

Robustin's stupid bastard sword

Maybe I'll just make it the Fellowship's version of the desword with a lower projectile deflection chance.

noslips and buyable bowmans

Thinking back on it, yeah these are unnecessary.

actual fucking mechs

I was thinking that the mech would be just as prohibitively expensive as the fusion bomb. Furthermore, you have to build it yourself. Maybe I'll make it so the Fellowship has to build their own mech weapons in R&D or else be stuck with a (still decently robust) punch.

shielded suits

The Mantle of the White Raven is powered by an external power pack and the energy consumed when protecting the wearer scales with the damage they would have taken or the duration of the stun they would have received. A Mantle powered by a single high-capacity power cell would probably only take a couple of laser shots or a single taser shot before draining the battery.

advanced energy guns

The microbolter would probably only deal a punch's worth of burn damage at a short range, more a personal defense weapon than anything. The pentabolter only has two firing modes: burst fire, which is unlikely to deal more damage than a single C20R burst on a moving target; and spread, which is basically a combat shotgun that deals burn damage. Since the self-charging might be a concern, I might make it so the pentabolter is powered by a power pack, and a separate self-charging cell would be purchasable for a moderate amount of Stardust.

some of the other concerns that may be had

• Balance-wise, I was thinking that a Fellowship with their shit together would have the collective offensive and defensive power of a stealthops team - something that poses a serious but not exceedingly challenging threat to the crew.
• The Fellowship can be found out and stomped on like a blood cult. Starting out, the 3-5 roundstart Fellows would probably have the collective offensive and defensive power of a single traitor.
• I'll probably put a hard cap on the number of items of certain types can be purchased in a single round (e.g. 1 mech, 2 fusion cannons, 3 Mantles)
• All of what I posted in the OP is subject to change, especially the set of items that is available to the Fellowship.

[huehuehue]

emag

I'd probably make the emag so expensive that the Fellowship wouldn't be able to buy a single one until late into the round. Even then, given how far into the round the emag would be available for purchase, it's only real use to the Fellowship would be rapidly opening doors that the crew is hiding behind.

I'd probably make the emag so expensive that the Fellowship wouldn't be able to buy a single one until late into the round.

why would you make it so expensive tho
all it's really used for nowadays is illicit access, fancy dancy machine hacking and making beepsky a fucking lunatic
fake edit

fucking antag drones

Yeah that was fucking stupid. Scrap that.

why scrap
you could just make them like the cuckcult's cogscarab

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

emag

I'd probably make the emag so expensive that the Fellowship wouldn't be able to buy a single one until late into the round. Even then, given how far into the round the emag would be available for purchase, it's only real use to the Fellowship would be rapidly opening doors that the crew is hiding behind.

I'd probably make the emag so expensive that the Fellowship wouldn't be able to buy a single one until late into the round.

why would you make it so expensive tho
all it's really used for nowadays is illicit access, fancy dancy machine hacking and making beepsky a fucking lunatic

I guess I could just make the emag a moderately high price, put it behind a fellowship headcount gate, and put a hardcap on the number of emags that can be purchased.

fucking antag drones

Yeah that was fucking stupid. Scrap that.

why scrap
you could just make them like the cuckcult's cogscarab

I haven't delved into that particular part of the code, but how do cogscarabs compare to regular drones balance-wise?

[huehuehue]

fucking antag drones

Yeah that was fucking stupid. Scrap that.

why scrap
you could just make them like the cuckcult's cogscarab

I haven't delved into that particular part of the code, but how do cogscarabs compare to regular drones balance-wise?

taken from the wiki:

There are also two cogscarab shells here; any ghost can activate one to become a cogscarab, which is a tiny little clockwork construction built to build and reinforce!

as far as i know they're just reskinned drones without inventory

[Wyzack]

Be sure to run this by the maintainers so you do not waste your time, they do not look kindly on conversion modes

please acknowledge this post before you keep going, i think Xuis did a bunch of work on something ( i think it was shadowlings ) and then got shut down at the end because he didn't clear the conversion modes thing with the maintainers

I feel like you are purposefully ignoring my post which is fine I guess but seriously do not be surprised when this gets rejected because maintainers are not allowing new conversion modes

[Anonmare]

Cogscarabs are very weak now since they can't use guns, are slow, can't ventcrawl, can't use slabs or leave Reebe without help

They have an inventory that starts with a "bag" full set of brass tools, sans multitool, and a fabricator and can freely add any non-bulky item to their "bag".

[ThanatosRa]

If conversion modes weren't so cancerous and prevalent I'd be behind this 100%.

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

Be sure to run this by the maintainers so you do not waste your time, they do not look kindly on conversion modes

please acknowledge this post before you keep going, i think Xuis did a bunch of work on something ( i think it was shadowlings ) and then got shut down at the end because he didn't clear the conversion modes thing with the maintainers

I feel like you are purposefully ignoring my post which is fine I guess but seriously do not be surprised when this gets rejected because maintainers are not allowing new conversion modes

I'm not really ignoring your post, it's just I've been busy with coding and life. I'll make sure to consult the maintainers sometime before the mode is in a testmergeable state, and if they refuse, I'll either leave the mode on the backburner until the maintainers are more open to conversion modes or rework it into a non-conversion team antag.

[Yakumo_Chen]

I like the idea of a power pack thing but power cells are ubiquitous. If you work in science you can just print infinite cells and the best ones aren't terribly hard to obtain. Also, slime cells will break the balance by providing infinite energy to your tools. Four on a belt means you're going to have a basically infinite shield or whatever.

Requiring them means you have to actually down a cultist to get their power pack item, not just disarm them of their weapon (which is unusable until you get the pack).

This is more what I meant by 'items that can't be used by normal crew'.

[christ110]

yakumo,
what if we give the weapons a small internal cell, enough for maybe one or 2 shots, and then have it trigger energy consumption from the power pack.

then we can enable the crew to use inducers to power these weaponry, and if its disarmed, they have one or 2 shots before its useless.

[kevinz000]

you can quite literally get infinite cells from science and almost infinite from botany we don't need another murderbone mode imho

[christ110]

Hey Yoshi, this still in development or has it hit development hell?

[Y0SH1M4S73R]

Hey Yoshi, this still in development or has it hit development hell?

I've been busy with finals and work on some other separate features. I'm also working on the overall design and trying to gauge whether or not the maintainers and the rest of the playerbase approve of the idea.

Among other changes, the Fellowship, instead of always being tasked with murderboning, gets a selection of five to ten traitor objectives, with only the occasional round where their objective is murderboning. They also have to preserve their secrecy by ensuring that no Fellowship-specific items reach centcom unattended or in the possession of a non-fellow.